Video: 2001 Malaysian GP flashback

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There’s a high chance of rain at some point during this weekend’s Malaysian Grand Prix.

It’s rained on the Malaysian race once before – in 2001 – and it produced a cracking race. Here are a few videos of one of Michael Schumacher’s best wins.

Michael Schumacher takes pole

In the second race of 2001 Michael Schumacher found himself fighting off the threat from a resurgent Williams team. His early mark of 1’36.282 (above) was beaten by brother Ralf who set a 1’35.511.

Schumacher sealed pole with a 1’35.220 with team mate Rubens Barrichello joining him on the front row of the grid. Last year Felipe Massa’s pole position time (with fuel) was a 1’35.043 – which goes to show how little lap times have changed in the past seven years as the FIA have fought to constrain cornering speeds.

Ralf’s race ruined

Ralf nosed ahead of Barrichello at the start but the Ferrari driver wouldn’t give up the position and the pair touched. The Williams spun in a spray of tyre smoke as the on-rushing pack dived around him.

Downpour

Halfway around the second lap Olivier Panis’s Honda engine belched out a lick of flame and he retired. At the same time a rainstorm blew across the circuit and as the leading Ferraris hit the mix of water and Panis’s engine oil they flew off the circuit at speed.

Both drivers re-joined the track having fallen down the field. But now all the cars were heading into the pits as the rain grew heavier – and the safety car was deployed.

Ferrari brought both cars in at once and if it looked like a blunder it was actually a smart strategic move. Having fallen to the back of the pack they had plenty of time to figure out which tyres they should pick. Both cars were sent out on intermediates which, again, looked like madness, as cars were spinning off the flooded track, but proved a classic Ross Brawn master stroke.

The track dried very quickly and the safety car spent a long time at the head of the field. Within a few laps of the restart the Ferraris were scything through the pack (Schumacher having upset Barrichello by wasting no time in barging past his team mate) back to the head of the field.

Highlights

The other star of the race was Jos Verstappen. At the restart he dived past Heinz-Harald Frentzen into second place and kept the Arrows in the hunt for points until the dying stages, until he was passed by Mika Hakkinen for sixth.

“It wasn’t boring”

After the race Schumacher admitted he’d thought his hopes of winning had died when he went off on lap three…

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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7 comments on “Video: 2001 Malaysian GP flashback”

  1. I was at this race and what a race it was. The downpour was interesting as from my vantage point at turn 1,  it was dry! You could see a line across the track where the rain had fallen, it never rained at turns 1,2,3 13/14 but the rest of the circuit was wet. You can just about see the wet/dry line crossing the track in the video above just at the pitlane exit. Looking back at it now, it’s a painful contrast to the GP last week, two ferraris off circuit, down to last positions but finished with a 1-2.

  2. I wonder why Verstappen is not in F1 any more..he was much more difficult to pass in an arrows compared to hakkinen and coulthard in mclarens..

  3. Jos Verstappen is not in F1 now because he and his backers asked for too much money when negotiating with Jordan in 2004. His position had been weakened by struggling to keep pace with Justin Wilson’s better races in 2003.

  4. the Brawn masterstroke is unfortunatelly impossible to repeat under the new safety car rules …

  5. sChUmAcHeRtHeGrEaTeStEvEr
    21st March 2008, 12:31

    i dont understand why they made those new safety car rules what does it really bring to make the races more exciting or safer?

  6. It was a safety issue. Under the old system when the safety car came out often many drivers would get a pit stop in because it would mean they could do so without losing too much time to the leaders. This meant drivers were racing flat-out to the pits under circumstances where there was a dangerous incident on the track.

    To stop that happening, they introduced a rule saying the pits would be closed at the start of a safety car period. It also gives the race director the option of directing the safety car and the pack through the pits in the event of there being a lot of damage on the start/finish straight.

  7. Hardly surprising Schumacher won when he put on intermediates then petitioned race control not to restart the race because it was too wet!

    By the time the race restarted, everyone’s wet tyres were shot and not suitable for track conditions.

    I somehow think he’ll have less luck with these days, especially people can defend a corner against him (Alguersuari) and don’t get an instant penalty like Montoya used to get.

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